Sites like this make me feel like the internet is getting closer and closer to being complete. Ashram-related gossip written in the style of Gawker? Check.posted by goldfinches at 3:18 PM on December 4, 2008 [5 favorites]

I can't understand any of the posts, and they're in English. I guess some people with Indian names did some sleazy stuff? Or something?posted by desjardins at 3:25 PM on December 4, 2008 [2 favorites]

I didn't know that Adi Da had died until I read it here. What a trip, that guy.posted by Roach at 3:29 PM on December 4, 2008

I looked at the Adi Da article on Guruphiliac, and started clicking around.

I have one thing of note after reading it: Bloggers (Gawker network in particular) If you use an inline link on an obscure topic as a tag (as guruphiliac did here) back into your own blog's tagging cloud, I hate you.

Roach's link was ten thousand times more useful.posted by boo_radley at 3:58 PM on December 4, 2008

Maybe I didn't read enough of the posts.posted by anniecat at 4:24 PM on December 4, 2008

Also, she's not as funny or clever as Gawker.posted by anniecat at 4:25 PM on December 4, 2008

I don't think he hates gurus, per se. His stated purpose is:

"While we understand that gurus are held sacred by many, they are also public figures deserving of scrutiny. Our primary aim is to inject a little humor into what can be an excessively self-righteous enterprise, and to illustrate the primary truth that no matter how divine their devotees believe them to be, gurus poop on the same pot we do."posted by Roach at 4:34 PM on December 4, 2008 [1 favorite]

Way more (belated) background on the sites owner here.posted by Roach at 4:48 PM on December 4, 2008

Yah... just skipping through, he's, for whatever reason or whoever he is, exposing the charlatans, hypocrisy, and fraud of these self-aggrandizing con men. Works for me. I've seen a friend get sucked into one of the ones he talks about, whom I've never met because the stink of fraud drove me off... from a very respectable distance I might add. She's happy... good for her... but I can't help but feel sorry for her that her bliss is based on such a scam artist. So he's ridiculing their ridiculous claims? OK!posted by emmet at 5:17 PM on December 4, 2008 [1 favorite]

emmet is right, this is a resource. For context, here's my anti-cult page, Guruphiliac included. I've been checking the site for a few years, he's been a consistent reporter/skeptic of a number of eastern gurus and mass movements like Amma the "hugging saint."

I also appreciated the news the Adi Da had died. Quoting GP quoting Bruce Morgen:

There is nothing so large
that it cannot be exaggerated,
no lily so perfect
that it cannot be gilded.

He emerged so suddenly,
so astonishingly gifted,
and died his own hagiographer.

Death resolves all paradoxes, even those as large as Bubba Free John.posted by psyche7 at 5:46 PM on December 4, 2008 [3 favorites]

Way more (belated) background on the sites owner here.
posted by Roach at 6:48 PM on December 4 [+] [!]

Running a guru-bashing site while having a guru is pretty ethically sketchy if the relationship is not openly disclosed. However, a lot of the stuff in that link actually made me like the guruphiliac guy, and I notice the page is on a site dedicated to "exposing critic’s smear campaigns against Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba" so there seems to be at least a bit of sour grapes there.posted by jtron at 7:27 PM on December 4, 2008

Religions are freaky funny but sometimes it is great to laugh at new ones, makes me feel cosmopolitan.posted by Bitter soylent at 5:47 AM on December 5, 2008

"No guru, no method, no teacher."

-Van Morrison
['In The Garden']posted by Sassenach at 9:33 AM on December 5, 2008

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